This invention relates to a musculoskeletal knee support and more particularly for a therapeutic anatomical support of the type used to apply pressure around the knee to provide protection and support during physical activity, particularly sports activity.
Various devices have previously been developed to provide therapeutic support to the knee during normal knee movements such as during walking, running or athletic activity. Typically, such supports are used to provide additional support for an injured knee so that the wearer can continue physical activity despite the injury. Various prior art devices are typically represented by those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,934,583--Hollingshead et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 4,084,584--Detty.
The present invention has been developed to obviate some of the deficiencies in the prior art. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,084,584--Detty comprises two separate pieces of material joined together along two substantially parallel seams. This two piece construction requires additional and unnecessary cutting and stitching operations during manufacture and multiple sized patterns for the two pieces for different sized knees. Accordingly, there is an increased risk that pattern sizes or cut pieces will get mixed up, resulting in the wrong sized pieces being stitched together during manufacture. For example, with the prior art two piece construction, if a small back panel is accidentally stitched to a large front panel, the resulting sleeve will be a manufacturing reject.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,934,583--Hollingshead comprises a single piece construction which avoids the problems with the multi-piece construction discussed above. However, the Hollingshead sleeve is constructed so that it has a single seam down the back of the knee which causes irritation problems for the user. Because of the way the knee flexes, it is desirable to have the seam of such a support sleeve at the posterior of each side of the knee slightly behind the line of the fibular collateral ligament and the tibial collateral ligament.
The present invention obviates the deficiencies of the prior art by providing a unitary, single piece construction, but which positions the seam of the sleeve along the posterior of the side of the knee where it minimizes the irritation problems of single seam construction.
A further deficiency of the prior art has been irritation caused at the back of the knee along the fold line of the skin. To alleviate this problem, it has been found advantageous to place a horizontal aperture in the sleeve at the skin fold line at the back of the knee.
Another deficiency in the prior art has been in providing proper support for the patella. Certain injuries to the knee can result in the patella shifting during physical activity, thereby increasing the possibility of dislocation or further injury. The prior art sleeves, while recognizing the problem, have not provided an adjustable patella support that permits a variation in the position of the support to assure that the patella remains in the proper position during physical activity.